You spent many years as the Head of Culture at Hawksmoor before founding The Good Life Coaching. How did that experience shape your understanding of what makes a hospitality business truly thrive?
Great hospitality businesses invest in their people properly. From day one, Hawksmoor understood that training, development and honest feedback aren’t “nice to have,” – they’re what allow people to do their jobs confidently and feel genuinely invested in. In an industry that struggles to hire and retain that is pretty important.
My coaching and workshops are now a piece in that jigsaw of helping people do their job well, enjoy it, and feel invested enough to stay.
Your coaching specifically targets restaurant founders and senior teams. What is the most common “missing ingredient” you find when you first start working with a leadership team?
Most leadership teams are stuck in what I call the “urgency trap” – where everything feels important, all at once. Hospitality is naturally reactive, but at founder and senior level you have to operate differently.
The missing piece is protected thinking time.
Space to step back, plan, and make decisions that aren’t driven by the noise of the day-to-day.
Learning to create and defend that time is often the shift that changes everything.
Having worked with giants like Ottolenghi and JKS, as well as acclaimed independents like Trullo and Rambutan, what is the one cultural thread that connects all these successful businesses?
Open, honest communication.
Teams that are encouraged to speak up early, say the hard thing, and give direct feedback. I talk a lot about the difference between being nice (where we avoid hard conversations) and being kind (where we speak the truth with care) and the best businesses choose kind every time.
This year’s theme is “Tiny Habits with a Big Impact.” Why are small, realistic shifts often more effective for hospitality leaders than major, sweeping changes?
Big goals sound great, but in reality, they’re where people lose momentum. They take too long, and in hospitality there simply isn’t the time. Small, consistent shifts work because they’re immediate and achievable and that builds confidence quickly.
I worked with a founder who was under huge pressure with her investors and wanted to handle them more confidently. The first change she made was stepping outside of her restaurant every day at 2:30 for five minutes.
That tiny habit helped her reset, make calmer decisions, and have more focused conversations with her team. It created a positive cycle that ultimately changed how she showed up as a leader. It started with five minutes and ended with a much better relationship with her investors.
Away from the business side of things, what is your favourite kitchen appliance or tool, and what is the “tiny habit” associated with it that brings you joy?
My salad spinner! It’s very retro – a wedding present my parents were given in 1973 – and it’s still going strong. There’s something I love about using it to wash proper, fresh leaves from the market – mud, caterpillars and all – rather than defaulting to pre-packaged ones.
It’s a small thing, but it makes everyday cooking feel a bit more connected to nature and where my food comes from.
What is the “next big thing” for The Good Life Coaching, and what impact do you hope to have on the hospitality landscape throughout 2026?
We’re moving beyond restaurants into the wider hospitality space because hospitality doesn’t just mean restaurants. It’s also cafés, pubs, market stalls, and also travel, wellness and other experience-led businesses. We’re already working with a broader mix of clients – from a sauna group to festival food and the goal is to support more founders in building people-first businesses that are both high-performing and sustainable. Because the future of hospitality depends on that balance.
Madeleine Geach runs The Good Life – leadership coaching and courses for the hospitality industry. Follow her @thegoodlifecoaching or email madeleine@thegoodlifecoaching.net if you are interested in working with her and her team.